Pamela Z

View Spark segment on Pamela Z. Original air date: May 2003. (Running Time: 9:12)

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Pamela Z is a composer, performer, sound artist and vocalist who creates works primarily with and about the voice, using her voice, sampling technology and electronic processing to produce performance events and recordings of layered aural compositions. She creates solo works combining operatic bel canto, experimental extended vocal techniques, spoken word and sampled sounds triggered with a MIDI (music instrument digital interface) controller called The BodySynth which allows her to manipulate sound with physical gestures. Her performances range in scale from small concerts in galleries to large-scale multimedia orchestrations in proscenium halls and flexible black-box venues.

Pamela Z has toured extensively throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan, performing in numerous festivals. She has composed, recorded and performed original scores for choreographers and for film and video artists and has done vocal work for other composers. Her multimedia performance works have been included in exhibitions in San Francisco, New York and Germany.

In the Spark "Technology Enabled Art" episode, we see Pamela Z creating and performing a layered, multi-media performance called "Voci" ("Voices"). "Voci" explores the sonic, cultural, physical and artistic worlds of the voice, celebrates the broad range of colors in the singing and speaking voices, and examines the scientific and cultural phenomena surrounding the voice and its many metaphors. In addition to Pamela Z's performance and live electronic processing, "Voci" features vivid, tall video projections designed by filmmakers Jeanne Finley and John Muse and a stunning lighting design by Elaine Buckholtz.